Our first full day in Washington and it’s cold and wet! Due to jet lag we were wide awake at 5.40am - note that as it won’t be happening again in the near future. We had stocked up on a few breakfast supplies but needed a caffeine hit so we had to stoop to using a Starbucks as everything in the city does not seem to open until later in the day.
We had our first glimpse of the White House on route which - rather like the Mona Lisa - was smaller than I had expected! We then headed down to the National Mall past vast buildings including the Ronald Reagan building and the International Trade building which is where I spotted this colonnaded walkway - nothing as good as a portico. The National Mall is almost 2 miles in length and it felt like we have walked most of it. We visited the excellent Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum, then lunch (when we managed to find somewhere) and then the Natural History Museum where by sheer chance we found the American equivalent of our Natural History wildlife photography exhibition on. I like Washington even though we were shattered by mid afternoon.
On the way back we passed some of the Senate buildings and were surprised to see that the police on guard (fully armed and with ear pieces etc.) were all Secret Service and this was emblazoned on their shirt uniforms! We stopped to talk to one officer who was really friendly and I so wanted to take his photo with Gulliver but I thought that would probably be inappropriate!
This evening we discovered Trader Joe’s supermarket which is a revelation in shopping.
